The development of the periderm: the final frontier between a plant and its environment

•The periderm of Arabidopsis is analogous to periderm in trees.•During periderm formation the endodermis undergoes programmed cell death.•Transcript profiling revealed common regulatory hubs between the vascular cambium and the phellogen (cork cambium).•Conserved transcription factors related to suberization act during phellem differentiation.